Issue 2: the ultimate explanation

Special Tri-State Treasure

Ohio Issue 2


Many of us are trying to understand the arguments surrounding Ohio's Issue 2 to amend the state Constitution to create the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board.  This special edition of Tri-State Treasures is dedicated to providing both sides of the argument along with an impassioned summary against the issue from a Cincinnati resident.

(1) The League of Women Voters provides a concise description of the issue, the composition of the proposed board, and a brief bulleted summary of the arguments for & against the issue:  www.lwvohio.org/assets/attachments/file/ISSUE%202%20-%20Livestock%20Care%20Board%20-%20FINAL.doc


(2) At these sites and copied below are articles presenting a discussion of both sides of the issue:
... from Columbus Business First: http://columbus.bizjournals.com/columbus/stories/2009/10/26/story1.html?b=1256529600%5E2318241
... from the Columbus Dispatch: www.dispatchpolitics.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2009/09/06/copy/LIVESTOCK_ISSUE.ART_ART_09-06-09_A1_UUEVV9K.html?sid=101
... and from the Cincinnati Enquirer:
       an op-ed piece for the Issue: http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20091029/EDIT02/910290373/1019/EDIT/For+Issue+2++the+livestock+board
       an op-ed piece against the Issue: http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20091029/EDIT02/910290374/Against-Issue-2--the-livestock-board

(3) And, here is a summary arguing against Issue 2 written by Shirley Reischman, a resident of Pleasant Ridge, who works as a homeopath at the Center for Advanced Medicine in West Chester. Shirley has been involved with farm-to-consumer food distribution in Ohio since 2001 & with Biodynamic/organic agriculture & CSAs in California since 1978. She lists as her information sources: Food & Water Watch, The Humane Society of the United States, OhioACT, League of Women Voters, Ohio Farmers Union, Organic Bytes, & Ohio Ecological Food & Farm Association.

Four issues regarding Issue 2:
 
1)     History
In November of 2008, Californians passed Proposition 2, the Standards for Confining Farm Animals, which requires by January 2015 that certain farm animals be confined only in ways that allow them to lie down, stand up, fully extend their limbs and turn around freely.  Florida, Arizona, Oregon and Colorado have passed similar legislation.

Ohio currently has more than 200 CAFOs (confined animal feeding operations), and owners are trying to prevent Ohioans from limiting them in the future.  Issue 2 is a preemptive strike to keep the status quo and permit more factory farms.

Issue 2 emphasizes the need of the livestock industry to provide "affordable food," yet ignores its hidden costs, including environmental contamination, human health impacts, and the loss of rural communities.  Don't let Big Agribusiness get away with a power grab that would codify abusive practices through the state constitution.  Please vote NO on Issue 2!

2)     Constitutional Amendment
The Ohio constitution exists to establish the structure and rules of our government and define the rights of citizens.  Its purpose is not to define the way a particular industry operates. Issue 2 is an inappropriate use of the Ohio constitution, and would set a dangerous precedent by creating a permanent place for special interests in the constitution.
 
Issue 2 would change the Ohio constitution to create a Livestock Care Standards Board, stacked with Big Ag and factory farm supporters.  The board would have sweeping authority to make decisions related to farms and food in Ohio that would have the force of law.  It would override any act by the Ohio Department of Agriculture and the Ohio Assembly, with no accountability to the voters.  There would be no further review or evaluation of the standard, no established forum for public comment, and no ability to appeal its decisions without a new constitutional amendment.

Abusing the Ohio Constitution to include a Livestock Care Standards Board would set a dangerous precedent by creating a permanent place for special interests in the constitution.
 
3)     Issue 2 will edge out family and independent farms and encourage factory farming.
·       Continued use of antibiotics and growth hormones, genetically engineered animals, cloned animals, NAIS (national animal identification system)
·     Low doses of antibiotics are administered regularly to animals in a preemptive move to ward off the diseases bred by unnatural, unsanitary conditions.
·     In addition to preventive medicines, animals are fed hormones and antibiotics to promote faster growth.
·     Pens and cages restrict the natural behavior and movement of animals. In some cases, such as veal calves and mothering pigs, the animals can't even turn around.
·     Metal buildings confine animals indoors, with minimal room for normal behaviors and little or no access to sunlight and fresh air.
·     In Ohio, tens of millions of egg-laying hens, veal calves, and breeding pigs are confined in crates and cages where they can barely move an inch, many of them unable even turn around or stretch their limbs. Six other states have passed laws to address this type of extreme confinement, but Ohio is lagging behind.
·     Animals are mutilated to adapt them to factory farm conditions. This includes cutting off the beaks of chickens and turkeys (de-beaking), and amputating the tails of cows and pigs (docking).
·     Millions of newborn male chicks are systematically destroyed by suffocation, electrocution and being ground up alive at the hatchery, because male chicks do not lay eggs and are considered mere "hatchery debris" on the way to becoming pet food and farmed animal feed.
·     Turkeys in commercial hatcheries undergo a series of painful amputations during their first three hours after breaking out of their shells. The newborn turkeys are dumped out of metal trays, jostled onto conveyer belts after being mechanically separated from cracked eggshells, then sorted, sexed, debeaked and detoed, all without anesthetic.  Countless baby turkeys are "mangled from the machinery," suffocated in plastic bags, and dumped into the "same disposal system as the discarded egg shells they were separated from hours earlier.
·     Recent food safety issues, including e-coli breakouts and H1N1, are the result of confined animal feeding operations which are a breeding area for more and more resistant viruses and bacteria.
·     Excessive waste created by large concentrations of animals is handled in ways that can pollute air and water.
·     Man-made lagoons on industrial farms hold millions of gallons of liquid waste, from which contaminants can leach into groundwater. The manure is normally sprayed on crops, but often excessively, leading it to run off into surface waters.  Nutrients and bacteria from waste contaminate waterways, killing fish and shellfish and disturbing aquatic ecosystems.
·     Industrially produced food appears to be inexpensive, but the price tag doesn't reflect the actual costs that we taxpayers bear.
a.     Factory farms pollute communities and adversely affect public health, thereby increasing medical costs for those living near such farms-costs that are often shouldered by public budgets.
b.     Taxpayers fund government subsidies, which go primarily to large industrial farms.
c.     Jobs are lost and wages driven down, as corporate consolidation bankrupts small businesses and factory farms pay unethically low wages for dangerous, undesirable work.

4)     Pro & Con Groups
The ballot issue is heavily backed by groups representing major agribusiness interests and opens the door for the proliferation of Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) in Ohio.  Supporters emphasize the need of the livestock industry to provide "affordable food," yet ignore its hidden costs, including environmental contamination, human health impacts, and the loss of rural communities.
The Ohio Cattlemen's Association
The Ohio Farm Bureau
The Ohio Pork Producers Council
 
The broad coalition of organizations opposing Issue 2 includes:
OEFFA - Ohio Ecological Food & Farm Association
OhioACT
The Akron Beacon Journal
The Cleveland Plain Dealer
The Columbus Dispatch
The Dayton Daily News
The Food and Water Watch
The Humane Society of Ohio
The Humane Society of the United States
The League of Women Voters of Ohio
The Ohio Environmental Stewardship Alliance
The Ohio Farmers Union
The Ohio League of Humane Voters
The Ohio Sierra Club
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Issue 2 passage might not end fight
Business First of Columbus - by Jeff Bell
Friday, October 23, 2009 | Modified: Monday, October 26, 2009, 8:00 am EDT

Bryan Black and Roger Wise have much in common as fourth-generation family farmers who support proper care for livestock and understand the importance of agriculture to Ohio’s economy.

But the two are divided over Issue 2 on the Nov. 3 statewide ballot – and their opposing views are a reflection of the split in the farming community over the best way to regulate agriculture in the state.

The proposed constitutional amendment called for by Issue 2 would create a Livestock Care Standards Board charged with setting rules for animal care, maintaining food safety and encouraging locally grown and raised food.

Farmers such as Black, who operates a hog farm near Canal Winchester, see Issue 2 putting livestock regulatory issues in the hands of Ohio farming experts and heading off efforts by animal rights groups to set the agenda.

“It keeps science in the foreground when it comes to the issue of animal care,” said Black, who raises about 3,000 pigs a year.

But Wise and other family farmers think the constitutional amendment is overkill on an issue better addressed through negotiations between farmers, animal rights groups and state lawmakers. They also call the ballot issue a power grab by large agribusinesses, including so-called factory farming operations.

“This issue is about preserving the status quo for a few special interests,” said Wise, a grain grower and former livestock producer in northern Ohio who is president of the 5,200-member Ohio Farmers Union.

The Farmers Union is part of an anti-Issue 2 coalition that includes the Ohio Ecological Food & Farm Association, Farm to Consumer Foundation, the Ohio chapter of the Sierra Club and Food & Water Watch. It’s taking on larger farming groups, including the 235,000-member Ohio Farm Bureau Federation, that are campaigning for passage of Issue 2.

Gov. Ted Strickland, a long list of state and municipal officials and a number of business associations are among those endorsing the ballot initiative.
Pre-emptive move
At the urging of farm lobbyists and with limited public debate, legislators in July moved to put the constitutional amendment on the Nov. 3 ballot.

The Farm Bureau sees the amendment as the best way to head off the sort of livestock-care ballot issues that the Humane Society of the United States has gotten approved in California, Arizona and Florida. Those ballot measures called for what the organization views as more humane confinement systems for animals such as chickens, hogs and calves raised for veal. In California, for example, voters approved a ballot proposition last November that requires livestock operations to employ confinement systems that give egg-laying hens, veal calves and pregnant sows enough room to lie down, stand, turn around and fully extend their limbs.

“We had to respond in Ohio,” said Jack Fisher, executive vice president of the Ohio Farm Bureau. “The Humane Society is a strong organization that is well-financed, passionate about this issue and working hard.”

The sort of livestock-care standards favored by animal rights groups, he argued, will drive up prices for eggs, dairy and meat products and erode the efficiency of Ohio’s $93 billion-a-year agriculture industry that includes 75,000 farms.

Issue 2 would create a 13-member board drawn from Ohio family farms, farming organizations, a food safety expert, veterinarians, consumers, a dean of the agriculture department at an Ohio university and a representative of a county humane society. The director of the Ohio Agriculture Department would be chairman.

“It will allow family farmers to engage in the debate and talk about all aspects of animal care,” Fisher said, adding that would include food safety and animal and farm worker health.

Wise, of the Farmers Union, thinks it’s ironic that agriculture groups traditionally opposed to expanded government regulation are calling for a constitutional amendment that would form a state board empowered to create livestock rules with no public input or avenue for appeal.

“Our constitution is a sacred document,” Wise said, “and should be preserved for all Ohioans, not special interests.”

A better approach, he said, is to bring together farmers, animal rights advocates and lawmakers to negotiate an agreement on livestock confinement questions. Michigan legislators took that approach to head off an expensive ballot fight with the Humane Society.

Wise said some of the livestock production practices at factory farms are “indefensible” and need to be changed. He feels that even the majority of meat eaters oppose inhumane confinement systems for animals.

“My opposition is in no way anti-farming,” Wise said. “It’s my livelihood, too.”
 
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Issue 2 would decide who regulates animal care in Ohio's biggest business
Sunday,  September 6, 2009 3:59 AM
By Alan Johnson; ajohnson@dispatch.com
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
 
JOHNSTOWN, Ohio -- Jim Heimerl is among relatively few people in Ohio who know what State Issue 2 is about.
 
That's because Heimerl, 52, has a 2,500-acre, family-owned hog and cattle farm outside of Johnstown. He says his farm would be severely affected if a livestock-standards constitutional amendment is not approved in the Nov. 3 election.
 
Heimerl said he fears more-restrictive animal-care standards advocated by the Humane Society of the United States could be enacted, crippling agriculture, Ohio's No. 1 industry.
 
"I've become very involved in this," he said during an interview last week at his farm in rural Licking County, 23 miles from Downtown Columbus. "I've been in this business for 30 years. This is about our livelihood, my family's livelihood."
 
Issue 2 would set up the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board. The governor and legislature would appoint members, including family farmers, veterinarians, a food-safety expert, a representative of a local humane society, members of statewide farm organizations, the dean of an Ohio agriculture college and two consumers. The state agriculture director would lead the panel.
 
While Issue 2 might sound banal, even boring to Ohioans not involved in agriculture, it's far from that. Behind the scenes, it's a high-stakes, big-bucks financial battle that showed a flash of political intrigue this year when the Ohio General Assembly acted at lightning speed to put the issue on the ballot.
 
Opponents, such as state Rep. Michael J. Skindell, D-Lakewood, say it's really about agribusiness interests working with the legislature to block regulations requiring more-humane treatment of animals -- allowing a chicken to spread its wings in a cage, for example, or a dairy cow to lie down in the barn.
 
"We should not be amending our constitution to put in a board or a commission," Skindell continued. "There are only two boards in the Ohio Constitution -- the State Board of Education and the Bureau of Workers Compensation."
 
The board would have far-reaching powers to set standards for livestock and poultry care, food safety, supply and availability, disease prevention, farm management, and animal well-being. It would have minimal legislative oversight.
 
Fearing that the Humane Society would propose a ballot issue similar to those approved by voters in California, Arizona and Florida, the Ohio Farm Bureau and other agribusiness leaders approached state lawmakers earlier this year. The response was swift: Both the House and the Senate approved legislation to put an issue on the fall ballot.
 
Keith Stimpert, senior vice president for public policy for the Farm Bureau, said Issue 2 "offers a much more comprehensive and thorough approach" to livestock standards than the piecemeal method advocated by "out-of-state activists."
 
"Consumers today want to know more and more about how their food is produced," Stimpert said. "They want to know that what's happening on farms today meets the standards."
 
The farm groups are expected to spend $2 million to $7 million, mostly on advertising, and have hired the Cochran Group, a seasoned Columbus public-relations firm, to handle the campaign.
 
On the other side, Wayne Pacelle, chief executive director of the national Humane Society, charged that the legislature acted hastily and pre-emptively after his staff met with Ohio agribusiness leaders in February.
 
Flush with their success after engineering the California ballot issue last fall, Pacelle said he came to Ohio "hoping to find a pathway out of these more inhumane confinement systems."
 
Specifically, they want to see bans on systems where chickens are confined for up to a year in cages about the size of a sheet of paper, pigs are penned for long periods in small "gestation cages," and calves raised for veal are kept in stalls so narrow they cannot turn around.
 
The next thing Pacelle heard, the issue was headed to the ballot.
 
"It does not preclude us doing our own ballot initiative, but it muddies the water," he said. "It's an attempt to forestall meaningful animal-welfare reforms in agriculture. It is designed to lock in cruel and inhumane treatment of animals.
 
"We're certainly going to oppose it," Pacelle said. He declined to say how much money the Humane Society plans to spend. Whether Issue 2 passes or not, the society likely will return to Ohio next year with a ballot issue of its own, he said.
 
Back on the farm in Licking County, Heimerl, his wife and three sons manage an operation that handles more than 100,000 pigs each year, along with cattle and some crops.
 
The struggling economy and fears about the H1N1 virus have cut 30 percent from his business.
 
Heimerl said he doesn't tolerate inhumane treatment of animals on his farm. He and other members of the Ohio Pork Producers Council are more than willing to blow the whistle on such practices if they are uncovered, he said.
 
At the same time, Heimerl, who took over the farm that his father started in 1947, is miffed at "out-of-state people who come in and want to tell us how to do a job that they have no background in. We're doing the right thing here," he said.
 
Wayne Pacelle, Humane Society said "(Issue 2 is) an attempt to forestall meaningful animal-welfare reforms."
 
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For Issue 2, the livestock board
Animal panel belongs in Constitution
By Rep. William G. Batchelder, R-Medina, is the Republican Leader in the Ohio House of Representatives • October 29, 2009 • Cincinnati Enquirer

Recently some individuals and groups have come out in opposition to Issue 2 on the grounds that the state constitution is not the proper place for the Livestock Care Standards Board. However, as a student of the Ohio Constitution for more than four decades, both as a legislator and as a Court of Appeals judge, I believe that Issue 2 should be part of the Ohio Constitution rather than treated as a statute, or regular law.

First, inclusion of such a provision in the constitution is not at all unique. The Ohio Constitution has at least 12 similar provisions, several of which establish councils as part of state government. Such important state functions as the State Board of Education and the Workers' Compensation Board are found in the same part of the Constitution as the Livestock Care Standards Board will be when voters approve it.

The content of the proposed amendment governs cost, quality, safety, and supply of food for Ohioans. That is, this provision provides for one of the most fundamental aspects of human life.

Second, some have objected to Issue 2 on the grounds that the constitution is difficult to alter should the board ever need revision. But Issue 2, like the State Board of Education, sets forth the form of the board, not the details. Those details would later be established via the administrative procedure and safeguarded by legislative requirements as found in Article II of the Ohio Constitution. Another safeguard to keep the process responsive to the people is found in the appointment process: The members of the board are appointed by the governor, which requires the advice and consent of the Senate.

Also, one member of the board is appointed by the President of the Ohio Senate and one by Speaker of the Ohio House. These safeguards make Issue 2 plenty adaptable, and placing it in the Ohio Constitution would not make the board unresponsive to Ohioans.

Third, in the absence of Ohio establishing such a board, outside entities from Washington, D.C., may come to Ohio and through the initiative process put a livestock care issue on the ballot, which could be arbitrary and capricious. Under that scenario, Ohio might be faced with a non-deliberative process to determine the best practices of animal husbandry and to meet the changing scientific needs of livestock care. Several states now have such arbitrary and inflexible laws. Issue 2 would preserve public access to the livestock rule-making process in Ohio.

Ohio's Constitution is a marvelous document that embodies the values and beliefs of our citizens.

From the Constitution Convention in 1912 came a document providing an extensive Bill of Rights, a clear delineation of the three branches' powers and responsibilities, and a clear empowerment of many boards and commissions to which Issue 2 is an appropriate complement.

Our forbearers would be proud to find that this generation has learned from their precedent and that the livestock board is a very proper application of Ohio's great constitution.

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Against Issue 2, the livestock board
Panel would protect cruel practices
By Wayne Pacelle, president & CEO of the Humane Society of the United States • October 29, 2009  • Cincinnati Enquirer

States across the nation are adopting policies to reflect society's concern about the well-being of animals and to clamp down on needless cruelty. But Ohio is an exception as agricultural leaders and compliant politicians maneuver to move the state backward.

Consider Michigan, where Gov. Jennifer Granholm has signed legislation requiring a phase-out of intensive confinement practices on factory farms. This modest law is the result of extensive negotiations between humane and agricultural groups, and demonstrates that antagonists can find common ground through good-faith deliberations.
A different story is unfolding in Ohio, where animal welfare laws are among the weakest in the nation and mistreatment is rampant. But Ohio's lawmakers are working to insulate factory farms from basic reform efforts. They have placed Issue 2 on the November ballot at the behest of the Ohio Farm Bureau so they can continue to confine animals in small cages and crates.

At a typical factory farm, thousands of animals are kept in cages or crates barely larger than their bodies.

The issue of industrial agribusiness was studied by the prestigious Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production - an independent panel that included animal scientists, veterinarians and ranchers. It unanimously concluded that battery cages for hens, gestation crates for pigs and veal crates for calves should be phased out.

In addition to promoting cruelty, factory farms generate enormous volumes of untreated animal waste that pollute the air and groundwater.

This situation cries out for reform. But instead, the agribusiness lobby has designed its own "oversight" system. Family farmers, represented by the Ohio Farmers Union, and good government groups such as the Ohio League of Women Voters have joined humane societies and environmental organizations in urging a "no" vote on Issue 2.

Issue 2 would amend the state's constitution by creating an industry-dominated council to decide all rules related to farm-animal handling. It's a status-quo measure masquerading as reform. No one really expects this council to make any meaningful changes. If the Ohio Farm Bureau had truly wanted reform, it would have asked the legislature to address these matters, since agribusiness has such inordinate influence there. Instead, it wrote Issue 2 and directed the legislature to pass it to make it more difficult for any citizen reform effort of factory farms to gain any momentum. Their goal is clear: They want factory farms to operate without limits on the care of animals.

Lawmakers beholden to the Farm Bureau placed Issue 2 on the ballot with lightning speed, short-circuiting debate and serious examination. Meanwhile, modest reforms that would crack down on cockfighting and puppy mills have languished for years with no concerted action by lawmakers.

The Farm Bureau and most state lawmakers want to amend the Ohio Constitution to make it more difficult for voters not only to address the humane treatment of animals in agriculture, but also to protect communities from factory farm pollution and odors. The voters should know better.